CoolThink@JC - Computational Thinking Education for All

Inspiring digital creativity - computational thinking as basic education in every school

CoolThink@JC is a Computational Thinking education programme donated and created by The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, co-created by MIT, EdUHK and CityU. Its mission is to inspire digital creativity, nurture students' proactive use of technologies for social good from a young age, mainstream CT education in schools and serve as a basic education for everyone.

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HundrED 2023

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Overview

HundrED has selected this innovation to

HundrED Global Collection 2023

Web presence

2016

Established

110K

Children

8

Countries

Target group

Students lower

Updated

July 2023

Inspire digital creativity, nurture proactive use of technology for social good from a young age, offer equitable access to high quality learning materials, and mainstream Computational Thinking education in formal school curriculum, as basic education for every student.

About the innovation

Why did you create this innovation?

We saw the critical need for modern curriculum, a basic education for every student to master 21st century skills and narrow the new form of digital divide. Our mission is to inspire digital creativity, nurture students' proactive use of technologies for social good from a young age and advocating mainstream Computational Thinking education in formal curriculum for every student.

How does your innovation work in practice?

CoolThink@JC is an impactful large scale Computational Thinking education program in Hong Kong, a US$67 million funding project donated and created by the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust since 2016. We convene the government, renowned educators, local and global institutions to systematically transform our technology education ecosystem with modern curriculum innovation and teacher capacity building. We push policy refresh to mandate CT education in school system, and our project has reached over 100% of publicly funded primary schools (>470 schools) in Hong Kong and our curriculum has reached to USA, New Zealand and Dubai.
CoolThink@JC is innovative for its vision and thought leadership in taking “Computational Thinking” on the center stage as the brand and priority to drive local and international adoption with a successful evidenced-proven implementation model for the world. We founded the first International Conference on Computational Thinking Education since 2017.

How has it been spreading?

We started a 4-year pilot in 32 schools to prove our model works. SRI conducted a rigorous 3-year independent evaluation for the project and concluded that CoolThink students significantly outperformed their peers in control schools. We continue our scaling out effort to reach critical mass of adoption. As of June 2023, we has reached all aided primary schools in HK, 204 of them are teaching 14+ hours of CT in formal computing lesson in their schools. We've supported >80,000 students, >1,200 teachers and >20,000 parents. Our curriculum received ISTE Seal of Alignment standard, received certification by Education Alliance Finland, won two awards in the QS Reimagine Education Awards 2021. The Education Bureau of the HKSAR adopted and adapted our materials to all primary schools in May 2023.

If I want to try it, what should I do?

Know more about our impact and design: https://www.coolthink.hk/en

Check out our pedagogy and curriculum: https://www.coolthink.hk/en/our-curriculum/

Download and access our learning materials: https://coolthink.hk/en/resource-kits/

Impact & scalability

HundrED Academy Reviews

Already working in 7 countries, the initiative shows great potential for success, especially since it focuses more on broader computational skills, rather than only focusing on coding. The curriculum has also received several awards.

Computational thinking is among the skills to be taught to pupils in the 21st century. The project has been implemented in several countries and research has proved the benefits for logical thinking and problem-solving.

- Academy member

Academy review results

High Impact
Low Scalability

High Impact
High Scalability

Low Impact
Low Scalability

Low Impact
High Scalability

Media

CoolThink materials now being used by NGOs in Canada to support underprivileged students in their community. We offered train the trainers workshop to volunteers who are now become class instructors.

Adopting and adapting CoolThink@JC learning materials, Hong Kong schools will teach 10-14 hours of computational thinking and coding education in all upper primary classes (age 9-11) starting from 2023 school year!

CoolThink@JC success factors

Two Jockey Club innovation and technology teaching content to be adopted and adapted in EDB Curriculum Modules. https://www.asiaone.com/business/two-jockey-club-innovation-and-technology-teaching-content-be-adopted-and-adapted-edb

What Does a Comprehensive Computational Thinking Curriculum Look Like? https://www.edsurge.com/news/2022-08-29-what-does-a-comprehensive-computational-thinking-curriculum-look-like

How artificial intelligence will redefine the future of work? https://www.scmp.com/presented/tech/topics/inspiring-digital-talents-tomorrow/article/3182052/how-artificial

Hong Kong on its way to becoming a global leader in computational thinking education https://www.scmp.com/presented/tech/tech-trends/topics/inspiring-digital-talents-tomorrow/article/3185255/hong-kong-its

This Program Is Empowering the Next Generation of Computational Thinkers

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2022-07-05-this-program-is-empowering-the-next-generation-of-computational-thinkers

CoolThink curriculum book sets in professional packing

Total 3 levels and 24 units of CoolThink curriculum are packed with professional look, available for both English and Chinese version.

CoolThink and Miss Little Inventor in Hong Kong Book Fair 2022

Miss Little Inventor appear in this year's biggest book fair with some cool unplugged activities on CTE.

Support parents and students during COVID-19 pandemic

Swift response to support parents and students in special school holiday by organizing 7 weeks of live CT workshops within a few days of preparation. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIjTCjXEyJE&list=PLCcVA2xplO661-bGzzhEX3I02Tqaxkpt0

Awards show pupils compute brilliantly

https://www.coolthink.hk/en/the-standard-awards-show-pupils-compute-brilliantly/

New book released: Computational Thinking Education in K–12

Edited by Professor Siu-Cheung Kong and Professor Harold Abelson, project leaders of CoolThink@JC. A guide to computational thinking education, with a focus on artificial intelligence literacy and the integration of computing and physical objects. https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/computational-thinking-education-k-12

CoolThink@JC Wins International Recognition Including Silver and Bronze Awards at the "Oscars" of Education

https://appinventor.mit.edu/blogs/angie/2022/03/24/CoolThinkReimagine

How artificial intelligence will redefine the future of work

https://www.scmp.com/presented/tech/topics/inspiring-digital-talents-tomorrow/article/3182052/how-artificial

Building an entrepreneurial mindset in the young to harness the potential of the GBA

The younger generation will need to develop a specific set of skills in order to capitalise on opportunities in an innovation economy The CoolThink@JC programme encourages students to take risks as they learn computational thinking, which helps nurture an entrepreneurial spiritBuilding success from mistakes The programme also trains students to develop their skills in computational thinking, which Yang views as a form of systems thinking that is based on feedback loops. By learning coding through programming tools such as Scratch and MIT App Inventor, students are empowered to take calculated risks in creation and problem-solving while also encouraging collaboration and peer learning, all of which are essential for successful entrepreneurship. “In coding, you always make mistakes – it’s not possible to find a coder who can develop a perfect first code,” Yang says. “By going through this process as a coder with CoolThink@JC, students start to learn to live with their mistakes, rather than holding on to them. Students are no longer afraid of making mistakes, as they understand it is part of the iteration process. As they receive feedback from different sources, they learn from their mistakes quickly, and the learning cycle speeds up.” She adds that innovation similarly requires being able to find solutions for problems, which people will be willing to pay for. “Entrepreneurship is all about solving problems, generating feedback and using that feedback to build a better product,” Yang says. “At the same time, this ties in with being able to work with others. If you have a team, then you are going to find solutions quicker than the one person who is working alone.”Read more at: https://www.scmp.com/presented/tech/tech-trends/topics/inspiring-digital-talents-tomorrow/article/3180964/building

CoolThink@JC Case Study – Spurring Change in Hong Kong Classrooms

In early 2016, The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust took a proactive approach by funding a four-year, HK$216 million pilot project, CoolThink@JC, to introduce computational thinking into a broad sample of schools citywide at upper primary level and thus provide a body of evidence and experience to stimulate longer-term discussion and reform. The Trust believes that the lessons it has learned as not only a funder of the project, but also a proactive steward of it, can provide policymakers, community leaders and other philanthropists with some useful insights on how to design and manage a project of this ambition and scale. This case study is therefore intended to share the Trust’s learning from the initiative.https://www.coolthink.hk/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/CoolThink_Case-Study_202012.pdf

CoolThink@JC Pilot Independent Evaluation Report by SRI

Stanford Research Institute (SRI) has conducted a rigorous 3-year evaluation of the CoolThink pilot project between 2016 and 2019 and the progress made by its students. The report describes outcomes of the initiative for students, as well as the experiences of teachers and other participants, and offers a set of implications for other stakeholders who wish to build on the pilot’s successes and lessons.https://www.sri.com/case-studies/evaluation-of-coolthinkjc-a-computational-thinking-initiative-in-hong-kong-primary-schools/

Students showcase their digital creativity in the CoolThink@JC Competition 2021

Created and funded by The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust, and co-created by The Education University of Hong Kong, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and City University of Hong Kong, CoolThink@JC organised its 5th annual Competition. It has attracted more than 200 teams across different primary schools, the highest participation number ever. Besides showcasing their clever computational thinking, programming prowess, problem-solving skills, and teamwork, students also impressed the judges by incorporating artificial intelligence in their designs.

Implementation steps

Get access to CoolThink curriculum

There are many reasons why you may wish to learn more and download CoolThink curriculum:

You can try out CoolThink curriculum, make use of the best of CoolThink curriculum to enhance and compliment your existing ICT curriculum;
You can use CoolThink curriculum as a showcase to influence your colleges to adopt Computational Thinking education inside the classroom;
You want to get trained and build confident in teaching CT inside a classroom;
You want to meet and exchange experiences with educators of similar passion and vision.

Follow the Registration Link (https://forms.gle/pWXsfZeoW6Fv2K516) to submit an application form. A 3-hour CoolThink induction workshop will be arranged for you to get a basic understanding of the curriculum framework, pedagogy and unit outline, and instructions to download the material files. The workshop will be organised regularly depending on the demand or typically twice a year.

Download curriculum from MIT App Inventor

Based on the Coolthink@JC curriculum, these 10 units comprise approximately 50 hours of content. Students learn to think computationally, while making mobile apps with MIT App Inventor. Developed by MIT App Inventor in collaboration with Education University of Hong Kong with support from the Hong Kong Jockey Club, this curriculum is targeted toward middle school grades and up.